He’s “a broken man,” but he’s hoping for a break.
Rapist cop Michael Pena is finally heading to prison for his monstrous gunpoint sex attack on a young schoolteacher following his sentencing today for the final rape-related charges in his indictment — but a pending appeal could shave decades off of his 75-to-life sentence, his lawyer said Pena hopes.
“He’s hopeful that an appeal will restore this sentence to something approaching human numbers,” said the lawyer, Ephraim Savitt, calling the current term, “a death sentence.”
Pena would have to live to be 103 before he could see a parole officer under the sentence as it stands now, as handed down by Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Richard Carruthers.
The judge had presided over Pena’s trial — which included the victim’s heartrending testimony of a drunken Pena pulling his service weapon and dragging her into an Inwood alley last August. He repeatedly threatened to “blow your f—king face off” if she opened her eyes or made a sound, she tearfully told jurors.
Today, the judge rendered the largely ministerial add-on sentence of 10 years-to-life for four rape-related charges that Pena’s jury had originally deadlocked on. The ten years – the minimum allowed by law — would be served concurrently, adding no additional time to his 75-to-life sentence.
Still, the judge used today’s sentencing to take a parting shot at Pena, who sat at the defense table in a baggy orange jumpsuit.
“This sentence in no way reflects the seriousness or the grievous nature of his crimes,” Carruthers said of the 10-year concurrent sentence, adding that he had handed it down “for one reason and for one reason only.
“That is to spare the victim from having to confront her attacker again,” he said, adding the Pena “has already been adequately sentenced” for the “depravity” of his crimes. The victim, who had sobbed in court as Pena admitted to the rapes in last month’s plea deal, was not present in court today.
Pena’s appeal is pending, and will seek to have the appellate division vacate the current sentence and set a lesser one.
No one — not a family member, friend or certainly an NYPD colleague — came to today’s proceeding on Pena’s behalf.
“He obviously realizes he has destroyed his life,” Pena’s lawyer told reporters afterward. “And that he has affected a young woman’s life, and disappointed his family and his police department.
“He’s a broken man,” the lawyer said. “But he has some hope that he will not be carried out of prison in a box.”